


hark the bluebells

by philthestone



Series: hark the bluebells [2]
Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: Basically Everyones Here Fam, F/M, Gen, for sennen, this could alternatively be titled "a fic about babies"
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-03
Updated: 2017-03-03
Packaged: 2018-09-28 03:55:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10070285
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/philthestone/pseuds/philthestone
Summary: “Well I have worn Papa’s hat more times than you ever shall,” declares little Alexandre, “as he is my Papa, and so there.”“Hush, Alexandre,” says Marie Cessette, “Louis can wear Uncle d’Artagnan’s hat if he likes. He’s the king.”“I don’t much like being king, though,” Louis tells Alexandre seriously. “So I shall forsake hats and things and be a musketeer today instead.”“And I shall be Saint Joan!” says Marie Cessette excitedly.“But whoshallbe the king?” asks Raoul, sensible boy that he is.“Well,” says Louis. “Obviously,youshall, Raoul.”“Oh,” says Raoul. “Well, that’s all good then.”





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [emilybrontay](https://archiveofourown.org/users/emilybrontay/gifts).



> a companion piece to "said God", because i found myself suddenly incapable of writing anything that didn't involve lots of babies. which, also, i am dedicating this to sennen because she truly loves babies as much as i do. the timeline is really ... truly ... i couldnt tell you what it is, and it's honestly FILLED with historical inaccuracies, but i'll make more excuses in the end notes and for now just say that this is part two of "phil ignores historical reality for the sake of family fluff"
> 
> reviews are sunshine and happiness!

**part the first -- "be kind, aim for my heart"**

“D’you think people’ll notice?”

“Hmmm?”

“ _Notice_.” Her husband’s voice is loud in the dark of their room – _too_ loud for the middle of the night, thinks Constance sensibly. Most sane people do not start conversations in the dead of the small hours with the sort of vehement curiosity in one’s voice that leads to the discovery of a spherical Earth. “There’s a real danger of it, you know.”

Constance thinks, with a half-puff of breath that is not quite a sigh, that neither of them are particularly sane.

“Notice _what_ , d’Artagnan,” says Constance, turning her head against her pillow to look at him. He’s frowning very seriously into the half light of their room, looking as though he has come upon a truly serious problem. Constance would be concerned, were it not sometime in the very _very_ small hours of the night.

“I was with the King today,” says d’Artagnan, after a moment’s frowning. “And he – well, he looks like Aramis.”

Constance blinks, into the dark. Vaguely, she thinks that she needs to sweep the floor of the kitchen – _how_ did she forget to do that today – and finish mending that old apron, and possibly wash the windows. And there was that letter she was supposed to write to Athos –

“ _Constance_ ,” says her husband. 

“Hmm?”

“This is a very serious concern,” says d’Artagnan. His voice cracks a bit at the end with the seriousness of it, thought that might just be the lateness of the hour. Constance shuffles a bit against the bedding, and then fiddles with the sleeve of her night shift, and then tugs slightly at the ends of her own hair.

“Have you considered,” says Constance slowly, “that you just know Aramis’s face really well?”

D’Artagnan is quiet for a moment.

“I – well – alright, _now_ I’m considering it. But he’s still – he’s still, you _know_.”

It’s the middle of the night, and so Constance forgives him for the lack of eloquence. She reaches out into the dark and pats his arm comfortingly.

“I do know.”

“He’s their _child_ ,” says d’Artagnan. “And it’s – well. It’s odd. Well – well not _odd_ , Constance, just – sort of, I mean – you know? When, when two people have a child. That’s – he’s almost a _part_ of them, Constance, and –” Softly, now, the concerned cracks dissolving into the empty space of their bedroom, and Constance would think, _ah, we’re in the clear now_ if she was not so very finely tuned with her husband’s existence that she can’t immediately sense he’s lapsed back into a frown. “I just – _God_ , Constance, mustn’t it be terribly difficult for Aramis? To be – to be _with_ his – I mean I know we never _used_ to speak of it because it’s, well, it’s treason and we nearly all _died_ –”

“D’Artagnan,” says Constance, not quite gentle and not quite confused.

“It’s just I feel like a right ass, now, because I’ve never thought of it before and – and what if that was my child, Constance? Would _I_ have been able to stay away?” 

Constance stills in her arm patting.

The garrison has long since been rebuilt, new wood and stone laid over the rubble that Grimaud left in his wake. They’ve moved back into a new version of their own home, no longer staying in the lower apartments of the Louvre – Constance had hardly batted an eye when Anne (sincere, generous, _dear_ Anne, craving the closeness of her friends) and the little King (adorably excited by the prospect of new playmates at arms reach, standing as tall as he possibly could beside his mother) had offered a roof over the entire displaced garrison’s head not two blinks after Louis’s coronation – they’d been too exhausted by the prospect of rebuilding from scratch, too relieved that everyone had made it through in one piece to protest the kindness. Were they still in the palace, Constance thinks she might be decidedly less prepared to have this conversation. Palaces, on principal, are not safe spaces – less so in wartime, even _less_ so when one is the enduring confidant of the Queen herself. 

But they’re back now, in their old room which she really supposes is their new room, and it’s just new enough to feel a bit off sometimes but just similar enough to the original that Constance feels more or less comfortable discussing the paternity of the king of France, the top of whose head hardly comes up to Constance’s waist and, who, Constance thinks, in any other life, would likely call her _Aunt Constance_.

Constance can make out the shelves she decided to add to their old-new room, beside the patterned drapes that she made herself, hanging colourful and bright even in the half-light of the small hours. She examines the drapes whilst she considers her response – she really does suppose, briefly, that she could easily answer with a teasing dismissal. Something along the lines of _well that’s_ not _your child, thank God, you fell in love with me rather than my dear friend, the Queen of France_. 

But something about the fact that this is a conversation they are having in the dark, in their bed, in the dead of the night – all very good reasons why she _should_ teasingly dismiss him and roll over and go to sleep – make Constance feel as though teasing would make her the worst person in the world, right now.

“… Charles?”

D’Artagnan turns on _his_ pillow, now, to look at her.

“Yes?”

“I’ve been thinking about it too.”

And really, _it_ could very easily be referring to the possibility of d’Artagnan having retroactively committed high treason, but Constance knows with absolute certainty, all of a sudden, that that is in fact the last thing she _does_ mean. And, for all his faults (deciding to embark on such heavy conversational topics at such a late hour, perhaps, or always leaving his pauldron at the foot of the stairs where _any_ fool – not Constance, no, but _any_ fool – could trip over it and fall flat on their face) – well, d’Artagnan knows her just as intimately as she does him.

He blinks – once, twice, and then Constance feels a hand fumble under the covers for hers. His grip has always been so strong, Constance thinks, with a slight thrill in her chest that has nothing to do with d’Artagnan’s hand and everything to do with how big his eyes have gotten.

“Really?”

Constance bites her lip. “I mean,” she says, very deliberately. “In the sense that I don’t think you could.”

“Hypothetically,” says d’Artagnan. “As I’ve fallen in love with you, and not your dear friend the Queen of France.” 

Constance feels a slow, slow grin grow on her face until it’s so wide her cheeks are aching. The war is over. Their friends are safe and happy and alive. 

D’Artagnan is _here_ , beside her, holding her hand in his very firm grip. And she does love him so _very_ much, and – Constance thinks that the dead of the night can sometimes make one feel particularly brave.

“I’m ready if you are?”

He grins, huge and lopsided against the pillow.

“The absolute readiest,” whispers her husband, voice caught somewhere between wonderment and awe and coming out so emphatically that his breath tickles her nose.

“I’ve got to sweep the floor tomorrow morning,” Constance informs him, as though that is pertinent information. Which perhaps it is, because in sweeping the floor she will pass by the little pot of herbs that she brews in her tea every morning, like clockwork. And tomorrow, maybe – she’ll not stop to take the pot off the shelf.

“I’ll help,” he says, grin widening.

“No you won’t,” says Constance, sensible once more. “You’ll muck out the stables, is what you’ll do.”

“Well,” sighs d’Artagnan. “It’s a fair price to pay, I suppose.” And he wraps his arms around her tightly, as though everything is right in the world.

**part the second – “but yet i preserve the right to laugh when i so please”**

“General du Vallon,” says the little voice at Porthos’s knee. “I’d like very much to thank you.”

Porthos looks down to where the King of France is regarding him with large, childish eyes, clutching in his hands a familiar-looking wooden toy.

He doesn’t quite know what to do here. Does he bend down? Crouch? Pull up a chair? The reasonable course of action feels to kneel, only his leg has been bothering him dreadfully on wet days since d’Artagnan did a bad job sewing it up two years ago, and it’s _particularly_ wet outside today. He can see the rain sluicing down over the awning just two feet away in the courtyard, its gentle background noise creating a cushion around their impromptu meeting on the Louvre’s marble steps. 

Porthos hates the rain.

Elodie, a particularly impish grin on her lips, had declared only this morning that she really loved the rain, Porthos, isn’t it so _fresh_ and _reviving_? She’d been right charming but utterly _insane_ , thinks Porthos, because the rain is wet and cold and miserable and his wife had, most certainly, gone barmy as a _result_ of the rain. She certainly had no positive opinions about it when he married her, or he might’ve had second thoughts.

Well. No he wouldn’t. But _Porthos_ hates the rain, and he’d really, really prefer not to kneel.

Except the King of bloody France only comes up to his knee and _really_ , Porthos thinks, there’s gotta be – protocol, for this. Somewhere. Right? D’you kneel when talking to the seven year old King of France?

“Your Majesty,” says Porthos, because it’s been two beats and it feels wrong not saying anything at all while trying to parse out his next locomotive course of action in his head. “With respect, what exactly are you thankin’ me for?”

“Mama told me you gave me this,” Louis informs him, holding up what Porthos now recognizes as the little horse he’d carved in his spare moments. Rare quiet hours away at the front, in the two lulled weeks before the last days of the war. He’d sent it in a letter to Aramis before he could think it through too much, rushing a post script at the end in his scrawling hand about how he’d heard the little King’s birthday was coming up, and so give this to him, maybe.

Porthos feels his fingers tightening of their own accord, now, because – well, he hadn’t carved the horse with the _intention_ of giving it to the King. It wasn’t a particularly big gift, or even very meaningful to Porthos; he’s always thought intention trumps execution in things like this, and his intent had been – well. He’s really not quite sure. 

He’d taught himself how to carve in his early days in the military to pass the time, keep his fingers busy with the steady motions. You could always find a bit of bark or a broken branch lying around, especially during long training camps in the forest. And he _liked_ it, liked making things, and liked giving them to people.

He’d been thinking of Marie Cessette, Porthos realizes now, now that he’s _thinking_ on it, when he’d carved it. Thinking about how he could make her toys like this when she was old enough to play with them, maybe in one or two year’s time. And suddenly he’d found the toy horse finished, its little ears and the grooves in its mane coming to life under Porthos’s big, rough hands.

But he couldn’t give it to Marie Cessette, because she wasn’t yet old enough – she’d probably choke on it and _then_ where’d they be, eh – and Porthos’d remembered all of a sudden that Aramis had always found his toy-making skills particularly delightful.

Porthos looks down at the King now, who is probably about to thank him for a little wooden horse just to be polite and magnanimous – whatever kings do these days – and clears his throat slightly. He wonders if he could explain, in so many rational words, why his brain had connected his daughter to his best friend to the seven year old king of France.

(It’s all very simple, if you really stop to articulate it, but Porthos is nothing if not a reasonable sort of person, and they’ve all already come close to losing their necks _once_ , and he’d like to keep it that way, thanks.)

“It was my honour, Majesty,” says Porthos now, to the little King.

Louis nods solemnly, which Porthos thinks despite himself looks terribly endearing when done with the combination of the little button nose and dishevelled mop of hair. Is one allowed to be endeared by the King of France, Porthos wonders? 

Sodding hell.

“I wanted to _tell_ you,” says Louis, “General du Vallon, that I have named my horse.”

There’s a beat.

“Oh?” says Porthos, because he really doesn’t know what else to say.

Louis beckons him with one hand to come closer, and Porthos tries not to think about his aching leg as he leans down so they can be eye to eye. He’d been expecting a rehearsed thank-you, he realizes, that her Majesty the Queen had probably encouraged him to hand out – she’s got a peculiar sort of sincerity to her that Porthos dearly hopes she can give to her son. 

(Just last week Elodie had told him in a sort of terrified whisper that the _Queen_ of _France_ asked Elodie to teach her how to cook! Porthos! And Porthos had said, “Well thank God for that, _chère_ , ‘cause her cooking’s shit.” And then, after a beat, “She does that sometimes. Adopts people.” 

Elodie had been been awfully bemused.)

Or maybe, Porthos thinks now, it had been Aramis doing the encouraging. Feeling like he ought to – to instill manners, or teach life lessons, something like that. Whatever it was first ministers did when the king was only seven and they were really the king’s father, and –

Porthos sighs, balancing on his good knee. Louis’s messy blond hair is extra curly in the damp, as Porthos is sure his own is. One day, he’s going to show his own children how to tie their hair back in knots, and how to say thank you to people who’ve given them gifts.

He feels another little irrational twinge of guilt, to match the twinge in his leg. The horse is so _small_.

But – oh. Pleased that they’re sufficiently nose-to-nose, Louis takes an exaggeratedly deep breath and puts his mouth close to Porthos’s ear, like he’s about to share a secret of most importance. 

(Porthos wonders briefly if all children are like this, or if the king of France is an exception.)

“Madame d’Artagnan told me that _your_ horse was named Didier,” Louis tells him in a sort of hurried whisper, “and so I’ve named _my_ horse Didier too, after him!” 

As if unable to help himself any longer, Louis’s solemn expression flashes into a brilliant, childish grin. Porthos feels his breath snatch away.

He’s only a boy, and that grin is only familiar to Porthos because he has known it so intimately for so many years, but _God_ –

And then Louis is grabbing Porthos’s big hands with his own small ones, and Porthos thinks that he may be the King of France but he is a _child_ , and perhaps Porthos should think of him as such first and foremost. Porthos knows children, in a way that he doesn’t think it’s possible to know any other kind of person. Once they decide you’re friends, Porthos knows, you really cannot ever let yourself let them down.

“Thank you, General,” says Louis now, a right bad attempt at being solemn and formal through his giant grin that does not seem to want to go away. 

“You like it, then?” asks Porthos, surprised at the relief in his own voice, his grin growing of its own accord.

“It’s my favorite toy of all of my toys!” crows Louis, all attempts at formality abandoned. “Mama says I am allowed to have a favorite toy, too, and I have named Didi as that! My _favorite_ , that is – Madame d’Chevreaux says I can have more than one favorite, but it’s not _favorite_ if it’s more than one –”

He’s chattering now, still holding Porthos’s hands and bouncing very slightly on his toes in an absent sort of way unique to little children – like he’s got no idea he’s doing it, the excited energy in his body trying its best to get out in any way possible.

“I can make you other things, if you like,” says Porthos, somewhat dazed, feeling his grin grow wider. Louis’s eyes (he _knows_ those eyes) grow impossibly wider, and Porthos knows he’s said the right thing.

“General du Vallon,” Louis tells him, in a voice more sincere than any Porthos has ever heard, “I think that you are the _best_ general France has _ever_ had.”

And then, seven year old child that he is, he flings his arms around Porthos’s neck right there on the palace steps.

There is a moment of surprise for all involved, it seems, as Porthos tenses instinctually and two steps away, Madame d’Chevreaux, good woman that she is, takes a moment before she cries out in surprise.

“Your Majesty,” she’s saying, hurrying over, “this is hardly appropriate –”

“I think –” Porthos starts to say, and then looks up.

Aramis is standing in the archway leading to the palace steps, clearly mid-step, holding some papers loosely in his hands and looking as surprised as Porthos is sure they all felt a moment ago.

“‘S perfectly fine, Madame,” he tells the boy’s governess, patting the king of France a couple times on the back. “He’s just a lad.”

Louis pulls away, the huge grin still firmly painted on his round face, and behind him, Porthos sees a near-identical one grow on his best friend’s face.

He can’t wait, Porthos thinks, ‘til Marie Cessette is old enough for him to tell her about the time he hugged the king of France. But perhaps he can tell Elodie about it tonight, in much the same tone _she_ used when she told him about Anne’s culinary skills.

**part the third – “the merit of all things lies in their difficulty”**

“You are not holding your arms straight, Raoul.”

Raoul straightens himself and tightens his little fingers around the foraged stick in his hands. 

“Like v’is, Papa?”

“Mmm,” says Athos, placing his hands on Raoul’s upper arms and lifting them slightly. “A swordsman must have impeccable balance.”

“Hm,” says Raoul, scrunching his eyes with concentration. Which is quite counterproductive to the exercise, as Athos is mostly sure that even he, with his extensive training, could not be a master swordsman if he could not see what he was doing.

“Raoul,” says Athos. “You are doing brilliantly. Perhaps, however, you should try opening your eyes.”

At three years of age, Athos is sometimes overwhelmed with how small his son is, his features all miniature versions of normal-sized adult features. To be precise, they are all miniature versions of Sylvie’s adult features, her nose and ears and tight curls residing three sizes too small on their son’s tan, cheerful face, fascinating Athos at every turn.

Raoul decides at this moment to thrust forward with his makeshift sword, a triumphant, “Ha!” accompanying his lopsided parry.

Athos is very proud of him.

“I did it, Papa!” Raoul tells him, swivelling around on slightly imbalanced three-year-old legs, his miniature-version blue eyes shining with excitement that Athos, for the life of him, cannot imagine anyone but Raoul to possess in such a pure and heedless form. 

“You did!” Athos agrees, his hand on the back of Raoul’s head to steady him. Excitement is good only in moderation, Athos wants to tell him, lest one accidentally topple over with it in an undignified manner.

But he cannot bring himself to say anything, only watch with a sort of swelling delight in his chest as Raoul turns around again and, once more scrunching his eyes shut with concentration, starts waving about his sword. Athos suddenly wonders how long these miniature features and tiny voice will last, and how he shall cope with the loss of it. How does one raise a child into adulthood? How does one deal with the rapid changes? Only yesterday he could cover Raoul’s whole body with the palm of his hand, and now his son is well in his way to becoming France’s newest champion swordsman.

(He does not have anyone to ask, for his friends are all in the same boat as he – Marie Cessette is barely months older than Raoul, her laughter filled with mischief where Raoul’s is filled with excitement, and Constance and d’Artagnan’s babe is barely a year old. And he can hardly, Athos thinks, ask _Aramis_.)

(… Perhaps he shall ask the Queen.)

“Are we having sword-fighting lessons in the garden now, then?” comes Sylvie’s voice, clear and bright from the step of the house.

“We are,” Athos confirms, once more steadying Raoul’s arms. “Now, Raoul, show Mama your parry.”

“Ha!” says Raoul again, smacking Athos across the thigh with his stick. Athos gasps aloud, clutching at his leg.

“Ah! You have got me, monsieur.”

“Look, Mama! Look!”

“He’s three years old, Athos,” says Sylvie, her voice filled with laughter as she makes her way down the garden path. The grass is soft and damp through the back of Athos’s shirt where he lays, looking up and squinting in the sun as Sylvie’s shadow falls over him, her clever lips curled with amusement. Somewhere to his left, Raoul has started running around the garden in circles, challenging the peonies to duels.

“The world is a dangerous place,” Athos tells her solemnly.

“I see,” says Sylvie. “And tell me, monsieur. Is our son up to the task of protecting this household?”

“I have complete faith in him,” Athos tells her, still lying on his back. The sun is warm above them, and Raoul’s childish laughter fills his ears.

“Come on, you,” says Sylvie, pulling him upright with one firm yank. “You can teach him how to make a decent soup; two skills in one day, eh?”

Athos grunts as a small body thuds into his side, Raoul taking this as the perfect moment to detail his victory against the flower beds. He thinks that this might be bliss.

**part the fourth – “there is no friendship that cares about an overheard secret”**

“No no – you shall sit on the right there, see, and _I_ shall be Joan of Arc.”

“But then _I_ get to be the king, do I not?”

“Obviously,” says Louis, “you shall get to be the king. As _I_ am a musketeer, and so there must be a king.”

“Oh,” says Raoul. “That’s good. I need a crown, though.”

“Here,” Marie Cessette says, arranging the wilted crown of daisies that Pierre had so painstakingly made a half hour earlier atop her cousin’s head. “You look very kingly, Raoul.”

“Thank you,” says Raoul seriously, climbing onto the large tree stump at the edge of the hedges and sitting down there, his back straight as a king’s might be. Louis’s back can go very straight, Marie Cessette knows, because his Mama has taught him so, but he told her last week that he doesn’t much like doing it. Straight backs are such a bother.

Raoul, however, must sacrifice comfort for his very important role of King, and Marie Cessette turns to their company’s faithful musketeer and says, “Now then, as I am Saint Joan, I shall need followers!”

“Me!” says little Alexandre, pulling on Marie’s skirts hard enough that she nearly topples over. “Me me!”

“Alexandre!” says Marie in a Voice, whilst Marie Cessette joins Raoul up on his stump. Marie and Pierre both live in the big building on the other side of the castle grounds, because Aunt Constance says that they do not have mamas and papas of their own but they _do_ know Uncle Aramis. Marie Cessette can see why they would want to be close to him, as he is usually smiling and always tells very funny jokes. He is also Papa’s best friend, and Marie Cessette knows that Papa has very good taste in best friends. 

“Budge over, Raoul,” says Marie Cessette now, trying to make herself comfortable atop the stump. 

They are lacking in decent number of stumps, and as such Louis came up with the brilliant plan of substituting _one_ stump as both the Throne and the Horse. Marie Cessette thinks that Uncle Athos might have what Papa calls “conniptions” were he to see _both_ she _and_ Raoul atop the same stump (it is really not that large a stump), but Marie Cessette does not think the stump is so dangerous, and besides, Madame d’Chevreaux is only a little ways away, doing needlework under the nice shade of the big willow tree. She would, Marie Cessette knows, holler if anything untoward was done.

“It’s _your Majesty_ ,” Raoul reminds her gravely, and Marie Cessette is somewhat ashamed at having broken character.

“Citizens!” declares Louis, whose messy hair has since fallen out of its carefully tied ribbon from this morning when they all went to church. They do that, all together, whenever Uncle Athos and Aunt Sylvie and Raoul are visiting, and those are the days that are most fun. Mama says it is because they get to be with their family, though Marie Cessette has yet to figure out if they really _are_ family with Louis, as Louis is the king of France, and wouldn’t that be something? (Marie Cessette isn’t sure. Louis is _mostly_ normal, as far as she is concerned, king or no king.) 

At any rate, Louis’s hair flaps around a bit as he waves his toy sword, which is painted nice colours and was apparently a gift from the Comtesse de Larroque, who Uncle Athos said lives in the country and has a school for girls. Marie Cessette wonders why some lady who lives in the country would send Louis a sword, but really, who is she to judge. Perhaps it is simply because he is the king. And anyway, it is a brilliant sword. “Make way, for the king!”

“I am the king!” confirms Raoul, nodding in a very kingly fashion, his crown of flowers slipping slightly against his curls.

“I want to be king!” says Alexandre, once more tugging at Marie’s skirts.

“You can be the queen,” Pierre suggests diplomatically, before Marie can say “ _Alexandre_ ” again in a Voice. Marie is very good at doing Voices, just as Aunt Constance is, and Marie Cessette often wonders if she can ask the older girl to teach her.

“You can be a musketeer with me,” says Louis, coming over and picking Alexandre up with some difficulty. “We shall be musketeers together, as that is the best thing to be.”

“The best thing to be is Joan of Arc!” says Marie Cessette, because she really does think so. And then, “but – oh. Saint Joan talked to God. I changed out of my best frock to play, Louis.”

Louis, who is still holding little Alexandre by under the armpits (he has started to squirm), says, “So?”

“ _So_ ,” says Marie Cessette, in a fashion that Papa says makes her sound particularly like Mama, “I cannot talk to God, because whenever we go to church to talk to God we are wearing our best frocks.”

“That’s silly,” says Louis, who looks a bit silly himself, clutching a painted wooden sword and a four year old, and sporting a ponytail which is no longer much a ponytail but once more its usual rat’s nest of curls. 

“ _You’re_ silly,” says Marie Cessette, who has not yet been taught that one cannot simply call the king of France _silly_ , even if he is one of one’s closest playmates. 

“I am _not_!” says Louis, affronted, finally dropping Alexandre, who decides that he has given up being anything at all and shall now just lay on his back in the grass and make cooing noises to himself as he plays with his fingers. Papa says that he gets that from _his_ Papa, Uncle d’Artagnan, but Marie Cessette is inclined to believe that Alexandre is just his own unique _entity_.

“Why would she be silly?” asks Raoul reasonably, apparently taking his role as stand-in king quite seriously and intervening to resolve the local disputes. “Louis, please explain your standpoint.”

“Well,” says Louis, placing his hands on his hips. “You can talk to God anytime you want.”

“No you can’t!” says Marie Cessette, taking this as the time to explain _her_ standpoint. “You must be very respectful, which means you’re wearing your best frocks.”

“So did Saint Joan wear her best frocks to war, then?” asks Pierre curiously.

“She must have,” says Raoul, straightening his crown. “I think.”

“ _No_ ,” says Louis, now rolling his eyes. “I mean – I don’t know what Saint Joan wore –”

“Maman says she wore armour like men do,” says Alexandre, from the grass.

“Interesting,” says Raoul, nodding and tapping his chin. Marie Cessette thinks that if he had ink and paper, he would be taking note of these comments.

“But she didn’t wear her best frocks!” finishes Louis,” because you can wear anything at all when you talk to God! I _know_ so, because I am the eldest and also the king and also Aramis _told_ me so, and _he_ knows everything!”

There’s an immediate muttering that is dispersed through the company as everyone takes this into consideration. 

“Well then,” says Raoul finally. “It must be true.”

“Mmm,” says Pierre.

“It probably is,” says Marie.

“Can I be Saint Joan?” asks Alexandre, from the grass, where he has once more commenced cooing, only he pauses in his cooing to ask this very important question.

“Well, al- _right_ ,” allows Marie Cessette, because she really does trust Uncle Aramis on something like this. And, also, Louis _is_ the eldest, so that must mean something. “I guess I can just be Saint Joan without changing.”

Louis grins, his cheeks dimpling hugely, and says, “Hurrah! Alright, I’ve got to get on my horse now to protect the king.”

“I am the king!” Raoul says again, as though he is only just remembering this, while Louis clambers onto the tree stump beside Marie Cessette and behind Raoul.

“Only two children on the stump at once!” comes Madame d’Chevreaux’s aggrieved voice from over by the willow tree, and Marie Cessette and Louis both look at Raoul.

“It would be magnanimous,” says Louis slowly (a word Marie Cessette thinks he _must_ have learned from the Queen), “for a king to walk amongst his subjects.”

“C’n I be a washerwoman?” asks Alexandre from his spot in the grass, and Marie Cessette giggles.

**part the fifth – “it is accompanied by such excessive joy that unless the joy is allowed to overflow, it will choke you”**

“Hmm.”

“Aramis.”

“Mmm – no, tha’s wrong.”

“ _Aramis_.”

“‘S ‘n … the trade agreem’nt … Mmph.”

Anne sighs, half with amusement and half with resignation, and stops trying to wake him up. It is an interesting endeavour, she thinks, to learn how to share a bed with someone, and they have both been obliged to overcome certain hurdles. Anne, for example, has an unfortunate habit of curling all of the quilts around herself in the middle of the night like a cocoon. It is not her _fault_ , she maintains, as she has never been educated in the art of sleeping in a bed with someone _else_ before.

Aramis talks in his sleep.

Well, sometimes. She wonders if she should even tell him that he does it, or if he already knows. Certainly, he knew from beforehand that he has the tendency to wrap himself around the other person at some point in the dead of the night, such that one may wake up to hair in one’s nose, or over-heating from the weight of tangled limbs. He doesn’t do it on purpose, she doesn’t think, but it can be terribly impractical, especially in the summer when it’s already so hot.

(She had, _once_ , had a conversation with Porthos in the gardens during which Anne vows she did not blush nearly as much as Porthos claims she did, and during which Porthos had said very wisely, “Take it from me, Majesty. Sometimes you’ve just gotta kick him off the bed.”)

Anyway. Anne blinks up at the canopy of her ( _their_ , she corrects herself, because he may have his own quarters down the hall but really – well, _really_ ) bed and takes a deep breath, revelling at the relative quiet of the early morning hours. She can hear one or two birds calling from outside the large windows, out in the gardens, and if she turns her head just so, she can see the pale blue light of pre-dawn sun fading in through the heavy drapes to the left of the bedframe.

In about an hour, they will both have to wake, and set themselves back in order, and Aramis will give her a sleepy smile and a half-salute and slip out the door to be present in his own chambers right before the maids arrive to open the drapes and fluff the pillows. It is sometimes hurried, and sometimes aching, and it is not, Anne thinks, perfect by any means.

Anne had come to the realization very early on that there were some things that she simply could not ever have again, and perhaps it was that early understanding that fosters such contentment now. 

(At any rate, she most certainly _did_ blush a great deal when she asked Constance about what herbs she had used to prevent herself from getting pregnant, to which Constance had responded with opening and closing her mouth silently for a few moments before saying, 

“I really – think. Your Majesty.” The squeak of her voice was quite evident, and Anne wondered if Constance had for a moment forgotten that she and Aramis were in fact married. “That certain – former soldiers – would know _more –_ about such – such matter as this, that we are discussing right _now_ –”

She had definitely forgotten.

“ _Constance_ ,” Anne had whispered. “I _cannot_ – discuss. _This_. It’s not _proper_.”

“You have a _child_ ,” her friend had hissed, and then glanced, alarmed, down at the baby in her lap as though six month old Alexandre could comprehend treasonous statements.

“That is exactly the _point_ ,” Anne had hissed back, and Constance, who was not quite as red as Anne herself because she had never been that Sort Of Person, had not missed the fleeting wistfulness in Anne’s gaze when she looked at baby Alexandre. She had also, without any more hesitation, offered Anne the remaining herbs in her little clay pot that sat on her kitchen shelf.)

It is not perfect, Anne _knows_ , but it is _enough_.

Anne stretches herself out, straightening her shoulders and raising her arms above her head only to drop them back onto her pillow. The room is cool, the early spring weather not yet warm enough to linger through the night, and Anne takes a deep breath as her skin tingles with the contrast in temperature.

Wonderingly, Anne looks about the room. She remembers with a sudden clarity the feeling of waking alone in these early morning hours in the past, small in her large room, the emptiness swallowing her when there were no appearances to be maintained. She had never dared revel in the early morning quiet, because it had not, not ever even in her youth, been her friend. _Enemy_ is too strong a word, Anne thinks now, and she has never been one for melodramatics. But it had been … lonely.

Anne feels like there was a stretch of time where everything was incapable of being anything but lonely.

But – in a few hours she will be joining little Louis at the breakfast table, and he will regale her with tall tales about his dreams (“I was an orangutan, Mama,” he had told her very seriously only last week, refusing to touch his breakfast until he described to her in detail how he, the orangutan, single-handedly rescued Madame d’Artagnan from English bandits). And then later she shall go for a walk in the gardens with her dearest friend Constance, and tell _her_ about her captivity amongst the English, and then meet with the Governor to discuss the city’s grain reserves, and then with Elodie to learn more about baking bread that is actually edible. And then, at the end of the day, perhaps she shall sit and finish writing to Athos about the heartache that all parents survive as their children grow older.

“He’s ‘n acrobat,” says her husband, his face smushed into the pillow, one arm draped warm and heavy over Anne’s stomach.

Anne feels an involuntary grin curl at her lips until she is smiling so widely that it _aches_ , and then even that is not enough, because the laughter is bubbling up in her chest and it bursts over, giggles escaping her lips heedlessly into the early morning quiet of their room.

"I think," Anne whispers to herself, "that I shall never be lonely again."

**Author's Note:**

> \- all the different part titles are quotes from dumas' original the three musketeers. let me tell u, folks, that book has some WILD one-liners, and also, i truly believe that every single one of these characters deserves to be considered an international icon  
> \- the kids' names are either taken from the original text (ie, raoul -- who DOES NOT DIE HERE, thanks so much), or from the show (ie, marie cessette and louis), or, in the case of little alexandre, are totally my own invention, except not really because alexandre was d'artagnan's dad's name  
> \- i really. REALLY dont know timelines and ages but at some point in this fic louis is twelve and marie cessette and raoul are six and alexandre is four. and thats what im sticking to  
> \- in an ideal reality where i knew how to write i'd have mentioned that athos and sylvie probably also have a little girl, and that porthos and elodie have like ten more kids and adopt five (exaggeration, but really, cant u picture them with a small army of children? i can, its very lit my friends) and constance and d'artagnan only have the one but they are in fact the garrison's parents, officially, so there. annamis really cant have any more kids because once again Threat of Death is a problem here, which is Tragic, but they can be everyones cool aunt and silly uncle and also parent their babyTM to their hearts' delights  
> \- speaking of, this falls somewhat/mostly into the "said God" canon, which means that anne and aramis do in fact get married in secret roughly two/three months after louis's coronation. they _would_ do that, too, because they are extra about everything they do, folks. and.... i should probably get around to writing that sometime soon, actually  
>  \- rip Historical Accuracy, i don't know her, but i really like the concept of aramis loving joan of arc bc like, patron saint of soldiers and also she spoke to God and i really think aramis would be about that u know? so anyways all the Kids thus know about saint joan  
> \- finally: in case u didnt know, i love anne


End file.
